Zimpher laid out an ambitious agenda in her third annual State of the University speech. She said the 64-campus system will add 100,000 online students, including international students and those who live out of the state.

"We need to put more well-educated graduates into the world to create and innovate our way into the new economy," she said. "To do that, we need a comprehensive plan to get more students in college, graduating on time and graduating ready for successful careers."

SUNY will add 10 online bachelor's degree in high-demand careers, starting with three in the fall 2013 semester.

The system will offer students credit for prior learning experience, such as military service, if students can pass assessments.

The SUNY system also will offer students the option of graduating in three years, which may make it the largest public higher education system in the country to do so. Zimpher said by 2015, 25 percent of SUNY students will graduate in three years, saving them tuition money and reducing the student loan default rate by 5 percent.

Zimpher said the system is focused on student degree completion and growing the state's economy. Helping more students earn a college degree will help more students find jobs, she said.

"This is the key to getting students to stay and work in New York," she said.

A spokesman said it is not yet known what the courses will cost because they are still under development. Zimpher did not say if the online courses would cost the same as traditional courses.

The system has struggled with course availability at some campuses. When required courses fill up, students who have been shut out may not be able to complete their degrees in a timely fashion. Offering such courses online will ensure that students can always get the classes they need, Zimpher said.

In addition to online credit courses, where the students pay tuition and actually interact with a professor, SUNY will offer some free online courses.

Massive open online courses, or MOOCs as they are known in the industry, are a rapidly growing trend in higher education. Complete courses, including lectures and classroom materials, are posted online and students generally take them for free, without credit. There is a growing market for these courses, which come at little cost to the university, and colleges are looking for ways to make money from them and increase enrollment.

SUNY will create its own MOOCs, featuring top professors, and develop assessments tests students can take for credit. Other schools that have rolled out similar plans charge students for such assessment tests.

Even students enrolled in online courses will benefit from the system's new push for more experiential learning opportunities, Zimpher said. She said SUNY will help students secure internships, research or volunteer opportunities during their studies. These learning experiences will then be designated on a diploma or recorded on an extracurricular transcript.

University at Albany President Robert Jones said the school would add online courses, particularly in the health care fields.

"We're excited about the role we can play in Albany," he said. "We want to be a key player."

Zimpher said the path to college begins when a child is born. She said SUNY will partner with more community cradle-to-college efforts that bring social and academic services into poor communities and center them around schools. Albany already has a partnership and SUNY will adds similar ones in the Mohawk Valley, on Long Island and in Queens, Brooklyn, Harlem and Yonkers. Zimpher said she will create a SUNY Cradle to Career Alliance that will provide technical and professional support all the sites.